Sea Urchin And Steak Are An Unrivaled Surf-And-Turf Pairing
If you're searching for the best surf-and-turf meal in town, you're in luck. Forget about lobster or shrimp, consider pairing a juicy T-bone steak with the succulent flavors of uni, the pale, custard-like organs found inside sea urchins. While the ingredient is highly sought after in the food community, the general public is often perturbed by the spiky exterior of the spine-covered creature, which is admittedly, not very appetizing in appearance.
Learning how to extract and prepare uni can be highly complex — though you can follow along with one TikTok user's methods (video below). To break open a whole sea urchin, begin by cutting around the mouth with sharp kitchen scissors over a bowl of water, then carefully peel away at the spikey outer layers to reveal the internal organs. Then, using a pair of tweezers, remove any non-edible organs and dunk the entire urchin in a bowl of ice water. It may take a few tries, and the daunting task of trial and error may be a bit scary when your ultra-rare and highly expensive seafood item is at risk, but the reward for a job well done will be absolutely delicious.
Sea urchin is typically eaten raw, but for this particular dish, you want to add uni to the top of your grilled T-bone steak. Be warned, if you want to try the combo yourself, it will set you back several dollars.
Where can you get your hands on the surf-and-turf delicacy?
Unless you're frequenting a high-end sushi restaurant, you likely haven't encountered much uni in your culinary journey thus far. Unfortunately, the delicacy is highly scarce, with more than 80% of the world's supply shipping directly from Japan, according to The Guardian. Finding fresh sea urchins can be incredibly expensive, due to both the scarcity of the global market as well as the high skill level required in cracking one open.
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If you're not among the lucky few who have access to a ritzy steakhouse on the shore, your only option for taste-testing the delicious pairing may be to prepare it at home, but it could cost a pretty penny. While meat markets fluctuate often, you can expect to pay somewhere between $18 to $25 per pound for a quality T-bone steak, and at least $37 for around 2 pounds of fresh sea urchin, according to the agricultural sourcing platform Selina Wamucii. Before factoring in additional ingredients such as herbs and spices, side dishes, or time spent cracking open an urchin and preparing the meal, you're looking at a dinner that clocks in at roughly $60 per plate.